Posted on 07/21/2009 6:00:15 AM PDT by Abathar
Agency Reportedly Feared Angering Congress
NEW YORK -- The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration gathered hundreds of pages of research and warnings about the hazards of drivers using cell phones, but withheld the information from the public in part out of fear of angering Congress, a newspaper reported Monday.
The former head of the traffic safety agency, Dr. Jeffrey Runge, told The New York Times that he was urged to withhold the findings to avoid antagonizing members of Congress who warned the agency against lobbying states. Runge said transit officials told him he could jeopardize billions of dollars of its financing if Congress thought the agency had crossed the line into lobbying, the Times said.
Critics say that the failure of the Transportation Department to pursue the role of driving distractions in car crashes has resulted in traffic deaths and allowed multitasking while driving to grow.
The research findings were obtained by the Center for Auto Safety and Public Citizen through Freedom of Information requests, the Times said. The newspaper posted the documents on its Web site Monday night.
The findings included:
-- Cell phone usage by drivers increased 50 percent, from 4 percent in 2000 to 6 percent in 2002.
-- Driver distraction contributes to about 25 percent of all police-reported traffic crashes.
-- Cell phone use is growing as a distraction while driving.
Draft recommendations from NHTSA included that "drivers not use these devices when driving except in an emergency."
(Excerpt) Read more at theindychannel.com ...
I managed to stop in time but what p*ssed me off was she never took the phone off her ear while she glared daggers at me thinking I was running a stop sign and going to hit her. She didn't even realize she was at fault and kept right on yapping away as she drove off. It's a good thing that the good Lord ever allows for do-overs in traffic situations, or her rear corner panel would have been toast.
Aw hell. I guess we will get a safe driving Czar.
I was going slow enough to avoid squashing him but the idiot never even stopped walking or talking, never broke stride.
I love the ones texting with one hand, smoking a cigarette with the other and turning the corner at the same time.
We got T-Boned a couple of years ago by a woman using a cell phone, she simply ran a stop sign. I know I’ll catch flack for this, but I wish our state would pass a law against using them while driving. It seems like every couple of months I have a close call because some idiot is texting or talking on the phone. I have accepted the fact that at some point I will be involved in another accident with these morons. I don’t want to hear about your “right” to use a cell phone. If you don’t want to wear a seat belt or a helmet, you endanger no one but yourself. If you drive 2 tons of steel down the highway at lethal speeds - you have a responsibility to the rest of us to keep your full attention on the task. That goes for eating, putting on makeup or anything else that diverts your attention from driving.-—JM
FINALLY! Someone said it! It's NOT holding the phone that's distracting; it's the mental activity involved in the conversation! For those who say people talk in their cars all the time with passengers, so what's the difference?
Extra eyes!
Here's a cogent comment from the linked site:
“Actually, the same studies show that hands-free cell phone is more dangerous than talking w/ someone in the car or singing to the radio. Passengers will stop talking when driving conditions are more dangerous and will alert the driver to dangers whereas someone on the phone will not. Studies also show that when talking to someone on the phone, the mind starts picturing that person and situation instead of focusing on driving conditions. Also, people who use hand-free devices tend to get a feeling of false security or safety, so they're less likely to pay attention.”
I was listening to a local talk show here in Austin one day and some gal called in and was talking to the host. All of a sudden, there was a loud crash followed by “Oh s***” and “I have to go”.
Before cell phones, they were the ones eating an Egg McMuffin, drinking a cup of coffee, steering with their knees and reading a newspaper spread open on the the passenger seat.
Irresponsible people aren’t new. We just manufacture more of them now.
People who would never dream of eating or reading a newspaper while driving think using a cellphone is perfectly acceptable and safe.The cellphone is one of those things that can be a blesing or a curse depending on the user.Too many people are insecure these days and feel they must be in constant contact with someone.
“The problem is that a cell phone conversation takes the driver’s focus off the road.”
As a Marine pilot we were trained to:
“Aviate”
“Navigate”
“Communicate”
IOW Fly the aircraft, fly it to your target/destination, then once you have those two high priority tasks in hand you can devote time & brain power to talking. (Yeah, I’m ready for all the wise cracks about Marines and “brain power” being an oxymoron)
If talking to someone outside the cockpit can become a dangerous distraction while flying, where there isn’t too much to run into (unless you are low-level tactical), then think how much more dangerous it is while coming head on at another vehicle with a closing speed of more than 100 mph, passing within 6 feet of each other.
And there is a great difference between talking on the phone and talking to a passenger who can see the reason for your long pauses in conversation and is highly motivated to help you keep the vehicle under control.
My 6 year old certainly doesn't. Maybe they'll just suggest a ban on talking to her.
Studies also show that when talking to someone on the phone, the mind starts picturing that person and situation instead of focusing on driving conditions.
What studies? And how exactly did they go about proving this? I've been driving with a headset for ten years and I haven't had so much as a fender bender. My focus is fine, regardless of what these unnamed "studies" might show.
Also, people who use hand-free devices tend to get a feeling of false security or safety, so they're less likely to pay attention.
I can't imagine there's any study to back this one up. Just some egghead with a degree and some government money making it up as she goes along.
The scary thing is, people not only buy this garbage -- they're perfectly willing to forfeit liberty based on it.
I'm glad you're a attentive responsible driver; most others with cell phones aren't. (No study needed; personal experience shows me that 9/10 are completely somewhere else when on the d@mn phone, whether it be in a store, the sidewalk, or behind the wheel!)
This is no more a “liberty” issue than laws against drunk driving!
Yes, post #11 is very impressive. Like your post, if we follow it to its logical extension, talking to our children in the backseat will be a crime.
Because if I’m talking to my kids, it’s no different than driving inebriated, of course.
This is mass madness.
Because if I’m talking to my kids, it’s no different than driving inebriated, of course. This is mass madness.
In principal I agree with you but these IDIOTS are not able to drive and talk on the phone, like others here I’ve sat and watched too many talking and not driving. My preference is that IF YOU ARE TALKING ON THE PHONE AND IF you cause an accident, then you’re insurance rates are going to go through the roof because YOU are going to pay all damages (automatically at fault).
Yes, small children in cars are a hazard, but that condition is literally impossible to solve.
You may recall a few years back the warning stickers saying “Baby on Board”.
I was in Germany where those stickers were first started; they large enough and were meant as a real warning to other drivers in traffic that the driver of the subject vehicle was apt to be DISTRACTED BY A CRYING BABY!
By the time the idea came to America, the real public service nature of the stickers became replaced by a “Please be careful of my precious baby!” mentality.
Unlike carrying children in cars, NO ONE NEEDS A CELL PHONE IN A CAR! (We got along just fine without them for 90+ years of motoring history.)
We have a society plagued by idiots... our institutions produce them by design. When you go about regulating everything and anything that makes idiots dangerous, you’re heading into very dangerous territory. If our society is too stupid to manage a conversation while driving a car, they can’t possibly be trusted with, say, guns (just for starters).
And let’s be honest... the reason the government pays for studies like this isn’t because of any interest in public safety. It’s to justify another fine and generate new revenue. Like seatbelt laws. It won’t stop with this anymore than it stopped with that, or DUI checkpoints, or lights-on-wipers-on laws, etc, etc... it never stops with anything.
“..IF YOU ARE TALKING ON THE PHONE AND IF you cause an accident,”
Unfortunately, no one talking on the phone will admit that they were, and the police aren’t going to do a phone record search for every accident.
I'm sorry, but who the hell are you to decide what I do and do not need in my car. You sound like a damned statist.
You're dead wrong on this one. The calls for cell phone studies have come from the motoring public who are getting fed up with the increasing menace that drivers using cell phones create. The state legislatures take up the complaints from their citizenry and enact some laws where they can (ie: school zones), but they need “objective” research confirm what everybody already knows by observation in order to enact broader restrictions.
We went through the same thing with DWI 40-50 years ago; without empirical research, any DWI arrest was subjective.
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